The Legend Begins Anew
In the beginning, there was only a churning turmoil of chaos. At the heart of chaos, where all things became one, appeared an egg. Having tumbled from the vortex, the egg gave rise to the Exalted One. From itself, two beings the Exalted One did make. Time started to spin. Space began to expand. From these divine beings, all creation was hewn from the stone known as the Progenitor Demons. The world created, the Exalted One, took to unyielding sleep. From the Progenitor Demon of Darkness the Primordial Demons were born. The primordial forces of light and darkness raged relentlessly; laying waste to the land without end. However, one day, the weakest of the races; the humans, decided to fight back. Utilizing the Aura Magic they had learned from the Lunarian race, the humans carved the stones charged with pure energy into Magic Rings; supercharging the rings with the Aura Magic. Being tied to The One Magic, the Aura Magic of the Lunarians charged within the Magic Rings was more than enough to grant the puniest race the power to fight back the forces of darkness and build civilization. Even so... The darkness is returning, surging over the world. Where there is light, shadows lurk and fear remains. Yet by the blade of knights, mankind was given hope. ---- "So tired...Asumu, hurry up!" A nasally voice called out. It belonged to a young-ish woman—her body was incredibly small, around 130 centimeters, or 4 foot; a delicate feminine shape, almost doll-like. She was a bit too skinny, with her eyes appearing just huge; her nose was small and her lips were thin. She had aquablue hair and vibrant turquoise eyes; wearing a green ensemble and white muffler, with her twin blades strapped to her back, the young woman called out, "Should've never agreed to this job." Resting upon a series of rocks above a cascading waterfall as her partner was doing his job, Leina Aquamarine muttered to herself once more, "We really should've never agreed to this job." "Let's not get ahead of ourselves..." A resonant and calm voice came from the trees to her right, next to the waterfall. The voice had originated from a tall man wearing deep blue armor with golden trims, with a deep blue cape and a matching helmet that obscured his facial features. In his right hand was a black sword with a golden handle and a blue cross in the center of the guard, and in his left hand was a thin shield that was blue with a gold lining. "This job is going to take us a couple of days, so there's no need to rush yourself. So take a few moments while you can." "Then we should make haste." Leina responded to the man, seemingly nonplussed. Of course, that was also because she thought he was compensating for something with his black sword, but truthfully, he looked like a knight of old, just like in the legends spread throughout the three dimensions...that alone struck a familiar chord within her. A huge castle floating in an endless sky. That was all this world they lived in was. Aside from floating sheets of metal in the murky waters, Aether was a floating continent. In the past, it took a varied group of craftsmen ten years to learn the boundaries of the world, and four hundred years to construct it. The diameter of the base floor was about ten kilometers—large enough that the entirety of Setagaya-ku could fit on it. Above, there was three thousand floors stacked directly on top of each other; its sheer size was unbelievable. Inside, there were several enormous metropolises, countless small towns, and villages, forests, plains, and even lakes. Only one stairway linked one floor to another, so one could almost die of thirst or starvation if one were unprepared—thankfully, the people who ruled the planet of Aether set up rings of light known as Translocators in order to connect the dots between each level, making it possible for everyone to move freely between the levels. Those lakes and locations that occurred naturally, they were false. The magicians of Aether managed to develop the magic to replicate states of nature in a mystical way. As a result, while one wouldn't get sick off of the water, one would notice an unnatural pink tint to it. This was Aether, the planet to the right of the Sun, and near Earth Land. "So, the demon we were sent to hunt, it's a new breed, supposedly." Leina briefed him again. "They're rare as of now, but if they multiply..." She snapped her fingers, manifesting a scroll in front of her. "It says here that it's a mutation of the symbiote breed. Do you need another explanation on what a symbiote is?" "Remind me." the knight responded, looking around to observe his surroundings in an analytical manner, holding both his sword and his shield up in a position. "I tend to forget things after long walks, plus it's rather easy to lose yourself in a place like this..." "It's a new type of demon that started popping up on Earth Land and then transferred to here; they're born from within the bodies of despairing humans, before it proceeds to destroy the human's soul before bursting from the host and gaining a physical humanoid body appearance and receiving the ability to disguise as the human which had given birth to them. Nasty stuff. They began to swarm here a few months ago for some reason..." Leina sighed as she ruffled her hair. "But we're dealing with a new type." Here, Asumu turned his gaze back towards his smaller companion; his masked gaze seemingly one of piqued interest. "Oh? And just what is this new type capable of? Surely is isn't something that's completely out of our league, is it?" "It's not out of our league. The symbiotes, as Exalt Alexander described them, 'make people sad before exploding them from the inside out before giving them new bomb-as-fuck designs'." Despite the juvenile terms, the description was apt. "Back on Earth Land, only people with any weapon or armour made out of Soul Metal were able to harm them, as despair is destroyed by willpower. But now, on Aether, anything can really damage them, it's a shift in power levels." To this, Asumu averted his gaze back towards the direction in which the river traveled, his pose indicating that he was ready to get back onto the move. "Doesn't sound like it will be too much of a hassle for us then. We've adapted to new situations before. Want to lead the way?" "I was going to lead the way -anyway-." Leina grumbled to herself. Truthfully, it was not so far along the road- her magical aura served as a 'tracker' of sorts- though the trail was a fairly bumpy one. Even now, one could notice that red-and-black vines were growing rapidly around this world, to the extent of nearly concealing the entire sky, which was tinged an ominous red. "The thing that's causing this...is the Forest of Discord." The Forest of Discord is an ancient sentient forest of great natural power which is hidden within the Great Dimension of Sealed Evil. Bounded by mountains and ringed by lakes and rivers, it is normally accessible only by a rip in reality. The forest seals itself from all except those it chooses to permit access. The closest significant inhabited settlement is the town of Four to the west of the forest. The Forest of Discord, rather expectedly, due to being a part of the Great Dimension of Sealed Evil, is an unearthly forest filled with monsters and covered in alien plants that turn anything that eats them into more monsters. The Forest of Discord is also where the symbiotes are birthed—by using despair as a trigger, humans in Earth Land are eaten inside-out by a specific symbiote in the Forest of Discord after said symbiote opens a tear in reality, appearing inside the human and wearing them as a skin. "That alien bastard caused all of this. He drew the forest to Aether." "Well then..." Asumu blinked, glancing down at the rather unsettling display before them with slight apprehension, but not enough to offset his mental focus. Truly, they were dealing with something that was not of this earth, and while he observed the settings below, he also took notice of what his co mpanion said. "He? You mean the one who was on the last bounty we saw?" "Nah, wrong guy. Big freaky guy, about ten feet tall, wears armour on his chest and head, made of magic, has about six wings, transforms into a dragon, nukes people with magic, preys on 14 year olds...pretty nice guy." Leina just summed up Amadam perfectly. "The guy on the last bounty, he was...different. I can't recall him-" As she was walking forward, a tree branch smacked her right in-between the eyes, knocking her down momentarily. "...Dammit!" "There's a branch there." Asumu quipped with a slight scoff of humor, standing next to her. Under normal circumstances, he would have helped her back up to her feet, but she could do it on her own, and would probably reprimand him for doing so. "So anyway, where do we start?" "Here's the thing." Leina sighed, rather disoriented as she rubbed her nose. "It's a fair distance away from here, but the target is sitting in one spot. It's...odd..." Indeed it was odd. "Like it's waiting for us. Anyway, let's just go." ---- SWISH! The sound of stones and bushes being torn from their places in the ground could be heard from far away- though it was getting closer and closer. What approached...was a massive, quadrupedal demon. Its body was predominantly lilac in colour, but its back and all four of its legs were violet. Each of the demon's legs had two toes with black claws. It had two large, curved tusks sprouting from its lower jaw that were white on their upper half and lilac on their lower half. The demon's conical, black horn was on its forehead; it had yellow eyes and a jagged maw. There seemed to be a trio of blades sticking from its chest. The thing was about as tall from the ground to a mountain. "...There it is. It looks like it has 'target' painted on it." "Well now..." Asumu said in conjunction, glaring over at the tremendous demon that was heading their way. He was expecting trouble during this quest, but he didn't think it would be ''this ''sort of trouble! The demon-beast's golden eyes glanced over at the two. The fangs of the enormous beast began to shimmer a brilliant orange, and an orange ball appeared in front of the behemoth. Gathering and condensing stray eternano from over the mountain ranges, the titan began to to pack more and more energy into the sphere, before releasing it- in the form of a beautiful geometric curtain of death that rained down upon the landscape- and more importantly, Asumu Godai and Leina Aquamarine. "...Already!?" Leina clicked her tongue, as she hissed those words. Drawing her twin blades, she prepared to slice up several "bullets" of this hellish barrage. "Asumu, now!" With a brief nod of his head, Asumu took the two, fang-like prongs of his shield and stabbed them both into the ground in front of them. A cross-shaped blue light appeared in the shield's center, before it expanded with a loud whirring noise, creating a rather large barrier of magic energy. Although the barrage of destruction was tremendous and fatal indeed, this magic barrier would prevent any harm from coming to Asumu and Leina. "Excellent work!" Leina praised her partner. FWOOSH! In an instant, the titanic beast leapt several stores into the air.... "...It's surprisingly fast for a fat sack of crap." Leina snarked- though the beast quickly silenced her with its landing causing an enormous earthquake that instantly caused the surroundings to look like a warzone. "In the physical sense, it might be." Asumu commented, pulling his shield out of the ground before pointing the two fangs out towards the massive beast. "But it sure is slow in the head." he finished his statement before a large magic rune expanded from the shield's fangs. From the center of the rune, nearly a dozen wolf creatures lunged out towards the monster. The lower halves of these wolves trailed blue Magic energy, meaning that they were projectile based. The wolves latched onto the beast's surface before exploding, creating large blue orbs of destructive energy. Instantly, the front left leg of the demon was vaporized from the impact, as it began to collapse to the ground, undoubtably about to take a large portion of the surrounding area with it. Letting out a devillish howl to the skies, the demon's horns began to gather and condense scarlet energy, before launching it towards the duo, as it split into a volley of drilling beams. Leina's feet began to amass wind, as she shot into the air. This was the Wind Magic spell known as "Air Waltz"- in essense, it used wind as a propellant to allow short bursts of flight. A myriad of flames formed on her hand- she used Shape Transformation to forge a bow of crimson fire. "Bow and Arrow of Crimson!" A single, powerful arrow pierced the skies, aiming towards the enemy.